


Past the Palisades

by Potterology



Category: Horizon: Zero Dawn (Video Game)
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2017-03-14
Updated: 2017-03-14
Packaged: 2018-10-05 05:59:27
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 649
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10299176
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Potterology/pseuds/Potterology
Summary: A series of drabbles.





	

Eventually, under the cover of moonlight and the smell of fresh salve brush, Aloy tells him about Rost. The brutality in gruff hands masquerading as a gentle guardian, how stern eyes would always follow her in the wild fields no matter how far she strayed and regardless of how angry their words ever became; how even now, his ghost follows her shadow and lends his strength in the darkest of places. Every ruin, every death brings her closer to an answer, closer to justice for his sacrifice. Rost the watcher, Rost the father, Rost the warrior. His absence forever keenly felt, yet with each passing day grows more bearable than anything which came before _. Is this how it feels to heal?_

“I hope you find what you’re looking for, Aloy,” but his voice sounds oddly empty – so very much unlike the warmth to which she has grown accustomed.

Erend stares into the fire and says little, though she does not regret indulging herself the secret, and for a long moment neither one says much of anything, until he starts humming some old tune. A Carja hunter travelling with them settles down across from her, fierce green eyes fixed on the crackling embers of the campfire, and joins, a quiet whisper of words only barely audible over the gentle breeze. It is a hymn. One she heard in her earliest days. One Rost once sang to her during a storm.

She waits it out, watching Erend between breaths.

Everything she touches leaves her wanting more; every rock and arrow and blade of grass, every footstep on untouched ground leaves a lasting impression on her insides, every fresh snowflake an imprint upon her skin. It is a strange sensation. Rost called it _wanderlust_. A desire to see all the world and discover the secrets buried underneath the dirt. But sitting in the firelight, existing among strangers who made her feel more welcome than _anyone_ in her own tribe ever had, Aloy could think of nowhere else she would rather be. Perhaps this was of a different sort. Because the landscape she thought of now was not field and mountain, but the swell of broad shoulders and bright eyes and a deep voice and a self-effacing humour which made her snort ungracefully, sometimes loud enough to warrant a dash out of sight from nearby machines.

(She will never forget the amusement and wonder in his eyes when she rode into a camp on the back of a Strider. No one had ever looked at her like that before: as though she were worth something unimaginable.) 

“What happened to your parents?” she asks, apropos of nothing, once they are alone for long enough to guess everyone else is asleep. It is almost as though they are waiting one another out; each the patient man. Erend brings his gaze to hers for the first time since they made camp.

“What happens to anyone in the wild? They died.” He looks sheepish enough to elaborate, “We grew up in a village near Meridian and got ambushed by raiders in the night – my parents were herders. Nobody special. They didn’t have a chance. My sister and I escaped, snuck our way into the city through a water run and found our mother’s brother. He raised us as his own. It wasn’t a bad a life.” And as expected, he shrugs – _seems to be his answer to everything_. 

“I’m sorry,” Aloy says quietly, unable to find much of anything useful to say. Another shrug is her answer. Erend, the perpetually unbothered, offers a hint of a smile to assuage any notions of pity she might be harbouring. 

“I wouldn’t dwell on the past too often, Aloy, not when the present is so much more interesting.” 

He stands then and rests a hand on her shoulder for the barest, briefest of moments before leaving her at the fire.


End file.
